


A Study in Red

by findmethestars (Atunenamedclara)



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: Anger, Character Study, F/F, F/M, Hatred, Love, Multi, Outlawqueen - Freeform, Passion, Past Relationship(s), Relationship(s), Romance, Swan-Mills Family, swanqueen - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-24
Updated: 2016-05-24
Packaged: 2018-06-10 11:43:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,232
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6955123
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Atunenamedclara/pseuds/findmethestars
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A character study of Regina Mills through the colour red. Who is she? What is she made of?</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Study in Red

**Author's Note:**

> Ok so, not really sure what this was, an idea came into my head after working on a script analysis all afternoon, so I'm in "deep thinking psychoanalysis" mode. So I wrote this, not really sure why or how or if it makes sense, but its meant to be a character study of Regina Mills based around the colour red, which I think is the colour she best fits the traits of. Does that make sense? I don't know.  
> Anyway, here it is, enjoy it, whatever you choose to make of it...  
> And as usual, all feedback is welcome, either in the comments or tweet me at @findmethestars!  
> ( Also, this isn't a piece based on ships, I have used all ships, canon or none canon to explore Regina in this, make of it what you will!)

Red. An interesting colour, it symbolises so much, all in the same few shades. Red can symbolise hatred. It can symbolise anger and fury and blood. It can symbolise desire, passion, lust, bright colours burning against a range of emotions all to do with need, want and fire. It can symbolise love. It can be used to explain the deep passion of first love, strong and fierce, where boundaries cannot be kept because all you know is love and the feeling of their hand running through your hair and the taste of their lips on yours. It can be used to explain old love, gentler, mellower, but still always there, always burning like a slow spark, never going out however dim it may seem to get. And it can be used to display dead love, a beating heart, crushed between two hands, the nails digging into it, spilling blood which once represented so much but now represents only pain.

Regina Mills was red. Everyone else said she was purple, the colour of royalty and luxury. But she knew better, she knew she was red.

She had been red when she met Daniel. Red back then had been the red of a gentle love. Of first love, of the only love she ever wanted to know. She had hoped for a red which grew and developed, from new love to old love, fiery at first and then deeper and mellower, but still always there.

She had tasted the softness of first love at sunrise behind the stables, her hair still wild from a night of sleep and his from the wind which dragged thorns through it as he rode across the open field. In these precious minutes the red had faded to a gentle pink, soft and new; ready to take on the world together, judgment clouded only by sweet naivety, nothing more.

But so much had changed since then. The red had deepened, warped, blackened to barely recognisable shades. The moment his beating heart had been turned to dust by Cora was the moment red stopped being about love and became representative of something darker, uglier. Hatred. A colour once so beautiful became ugly.

She had tried to hold onto the sweetness, but no matter what she did the darkness always found a way through.

In her darkest hours it had always been there. She saw red in the countless people she had murdered, in their blood, blood which would always stain her hand no matter how hard she washed it away. She saw red in their fear, when they pleaded with her in unspoken words, begging for mercy. The fear in their eyes was deep and black, red only around the edges. And she took that fear and she crushed it between her hands, time and time again.

The only thing guiding her during these long lonely years was her anger, a spark in an ocean of black. The apple she had given Snow was red. And Snow had taken the apple for love, another shade in an endless line. Oh how Regina had envied Snow’s belief. But envy was green and Regina was red. So she took that envy and did with it the only thing she knew how to. She destroyed the envy by turning it to anger and hatred and then crushed the hopes and dreams of another, because how could they have happiness and hope when she knew only pain?

There had been no red when she came to Storybrooke, there had been no colour at all. Just shades of neutral grey and brown, stretching as far as the eye could see. And Regina Mills was _bored._ Because the red had been exciting, even at its darkest deepest times, when it had represented all that she had lost, red was dangerous and hot and ever changing.

But then the world had tilted on its axis and everything changed again. There had been red in the sunset on the day she put Henry in his crib for the first time. And she felt something in her blackened heart which she hadn’t for a long time. Love, she felt love. And not just any love, but a gentle love, a love full of infinite potential. And in that moment Regina Mills promised herself that the only red Henry would ever know would be one of love, never would he see the sparks of hatred she so easily played with.

And for a while her life was fine.

But then _she_ walked in. Her with the golden hair and brash voice and red jacket.  And Regina’s world shrunk once more, into a pinpoint of anger and fury and frustration.

The world once more presented itself to her in shades of red. She saw red on Kathryne’s cheeks, flushed with shame when she realised what David was doing, and in return she transferred _her_ red, _her_ rage, onto the hands of Snow White once more, no longer glowing with first love but instead with shame and humiliation, blossoming into anger when she realised what had happened.

Regina Mills saw so much in so many shades of red that she could no longer keep track of each and every feeling, of every spark of pain, every flicker of love, every hope which was crushed time and time again.

The red of passion in the vault with Robin where she gave all of herself for all of him and the red of shame when she realised what she had done the next day.

The blind red panic when Emma sacrificed herself for Regina and Regina didn’t know what to do because the person anchoring her in sense and sensibility was gone, replaced by someone who saw the deepest of blacks instead of the brightest of whites.

Red hot anger, burning so bright it was almost white, when she found out what Emma had done to her, to all of them, taking her memories, breaking her son’s heart.

And then she found herself in hell and she found peace with her father and peace with her mother and realised that if they could move on, if they could find happiness, maybe she could too. And the red dulled itself, from a harsh ache to a gentle numbing pain, something she could forget about if she tried.

Red wound itself around the words Robin whispered to her moments before his death. “You are my future”. Each syllable had branded itself onto her heart, causing only more pain when he was ripped away from her.

And then there was a blur. A blur of red anger when Hook was alive, a blur of panic when Henry ran away, when she thought she may lose him forever. But she sought comfort in the red too. In the warm red leather, in the smell of red fast food containers in a yellow car, in the red heat of another’s hand in hers, reassuring her when she needed it most.

But now the red was gone. The pain, the anger, the rage, the love, all of it, every shade she had ever known, it was all gone.

And now she was whole again, a soft pink breaking on the horizon of a new day. Regina Mills was whole again, the darkness gone. But without the darkness, without the passion and the fire, who was she? Who was Regina Mills?

 


End file.
